Alms for Oblivion

William Heath was born in Youngstown, Ohio, on 27 June 1942. A graduate of Hiram College, with a Ph.D. in American Studies from Case Western Reserve, he has taught American literature and creative writing at Kenyon, Transylvania, Vassar, and the University of Seville as the Fulbright professor of American literature. Since 1981 he taught at Mount Saint Mary’s University, where he edited The Monocacy Valley Review, which won national awards for excellence, and retired in 2007as a Professor Emeritus. The William Heath Award is given annually to honor a student writer. In 2008–9 he was the Sophia M. Libman Professor of Humanities at Hood College. In 2022 he received the Lifetime Achievement Award from Hiram. Heath’s novel about the civil rights movement in Mississippi, The Children Bob Moses Led (Milkweed Editions, 1995, paperback 1997), won the Hackney Literary Award for best novel, was nominated for the National Book Award and the Pulitzer Prize, and by Joyce Carol Oates for the Ainsfie